The Insider

The Army has awarded Raytheon a $5 billion contract for the Coyote Missile System, which will buy launchers, kinetic and non-kinetic interceptors and Ku-band radio frequency system radars, according to a Monday Pentagon contract announcement.

The cost-plus-fixed-fee contract has a completion date of Sept. 28, 2033, with “work locations and funding” to be determined with each order, according to the notice.

The announcement of the Coyote contract was made one day before the end of fiscal year 2025. In its FY-26 unfunded priorities list, the Army had included $207 million for the coyote counter-small unmanned aerial system missile effector, used to destroy small drones, Inside Defense previously reported.

The Pentagon also announced a $982 million contract to Mistral on Monday to provide “lethal unmanned systems,” according to a notice. That contract has an estimated completion date of Sept. 29, 2030.

Earlier this year, the Defense Innovation Unit, in collaboration with Singapore’s Ministry of Defense, selected Mistral to be among the winners as part of its Joint Innovation Challenge that focused on dual-use technologies supporting two operational demands for drone warfare.

Anduril Industries and Zone 5 Technologies have wrapped up recent development sprints and initial flight tests for the prototype systems they're building for the Defense Innovation Unit's drone-defeat program.

According to DIU, both companies are now refining their designs through iterative improvements as they work to secure approval for a live fire test event slated for summer 2026.

The update comes less than a year after DIU selected the vendors last fall from a pool of more than 65 applicants vying to build Counter NEXT prototypes. The program seeks counter-uncrewed aerial system technologies that maximize the use of commercial off-the-shelf components, minimize costly materials and are designed for mass production.

“The Counter NEXT project is focused on leveraging the best-in-breed commercially derived technology and processes to accelerate the development, production, and fielding of these vital Counter UAS interceptors to our warfighters,” said Joshua Zike, DIU’s Counter NEXT program manager.

The solutions are also using modular open systems architectures to make future design improvements and rapidly integrate subsystems and components on a rolling basis. All those components, DIU said, will be held to some of the highest military standards so warfighters can rely on the technology across differing operational environments.

While Counter NEXT is focused on C-UAS capabilities, DIU’s Zike wants to expand the focus on countering uncrewed systems across all military domains.

“Variants for all domains should be developed and deployed to provide this vital layered kinetic counter [uncrewed systems] defeat capability to all our warfighters,” he said.

DIU said Anduril and Zone 5 received additional funding after the flight tests to rapidly refine their prototypes based on sprint lessons and warfighter feedback, integrate with mission partner combat systems, and complete safety testing ahead of the summer 2026 live fire event.

The announcement comes more than six months after the Air Force and DIU selected both vendors to build next-generation, precision-guided munitions using COTS components for the second phase of an Enterprise Test Vehicle (ETV) project.

This Friday INSIDER Daily Digest has news on the Space Force's next set of "neighborhood watch" satellites, the Air Force's Collaborative Combat Aircraft program, Army vehicles and more.

We start off with continuing coverage of the AFA Air, Space and Cyber conference:

GSSAP replacement RFP coming soon, Space Force official says

NATIONAL HARBOR, MD -- The Space Force may soon request proposals for its next set of "neighborhood watch" satellites for on-orbit space domain awareness, a top official told reporters this week, opening the way for commercial entrants.

Air Force has solicited propulsion firms for CCA increment two engine proposals

NATIONAL HARBOR, MD -- Within the last year, the Air Force has asked industry to submit both small- and medium-thrust-class engine proposals to potentially power the next increment of the service's Collaborative Combat Aircraft program and other unmanned aerial systems, a Honeywell executive told Inside Defense.

Read our full AFA coverage.

Army vehicle news:

Army wants technical data rights to mend CTT at depots and in the field

The Army is marching forward on its plan to fold right-to-repair provisions into new contracts after releasing an update to industry that sheds more light on what the future requirement will look like for its Common Tactical Truck program.

No Army ground vehicles met service's readiness standard in FY-24, GAO finds

The past decade has seen an across-the-board downturn in readiness rates for Army ground vehicles, with none of its fleet last year reportedly up to par with the service's goal for mission capability, a new congressional watchdog report has found.

Document: GAO's ground vehicle sustainment report

Our colleagues at Inside Cybersecurity have coverage of the Pentagon's recently released cybersecurity risk management construct:

Pentagon launches new cyber risk management approach focused on speed, continuous monitoring

The Defense Department has unveiled a new framework for cyber risk management with a focus on automation, speed and the use of continuous monitoring.

Document: DOD's cybersecurity risk management construct

The Navy plans to hold an industry day for a new missile program -- the Naval Modular Missile -- this fall, introducing industry to a next-generation initiative that will focus on multimission flexibility, enhanced capacity and a modular open architecture.

Naval Sea Systems Command will hold the industry day Oct. 21-22 at the John Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, MD, where the NMM will be introduced to industry partners and more details on the program’s acquisition strategy will be shared, according to a recent government notice.

“The goal is to identify performers to support the development of a dynamic, multimission Family of Missiles (FOM) that will enhance naval lethality and operational flexibility,” the notice states.

According to the notice, NMM will be made up of a long-range hypersonic variant and scalable configurations, multiple weapons in a single launcher cell, and will be created through a collaborative approach with the U.S. Air Force to begin an open government-reference architecture. This will allow “industry to develop and integrate best-of-breed solutions -- from individual components to the All-Up-Round,” the notice states.

There will be a high-level presentation of the program and its top-level requirements, a Program Executive Office Integrated Warfare Systems program overview, an open architecture discussion and Q&A and feedback sessions.

The Navy plans to release several Request for Proposals in fiscal year 2026, the notice adds. It is seeking participation from non-traditional defense contractors and small businesses, and parties interested in attending the industry day must respond by Oct. 3.

This Wednesday INSIDER Daily Digest has news on the Pentagon's Joint Fires Network battle management system, the White House's fiscal year 2027 research and development priorities for all federal agencies and more.

We start off with coverage from this week's Air and Space Force Association's Air, Space, Cyber conference:

Air Force C3BM office taking over Joint Fires Network, other programs of record

NATIONAL HARBOR, MD -- The Pentagon's Joint Fires Network battle management system is transferring to the Air Force's Command, Control, Communication and Battle Management office next week, a senior service official said, but much of the JFN process will be the same.

Space Force creating Objective Force, Future Operational Environment documents

NATIONAL HARBOR, MD -- The Space Force is developing two reports to guide the service's long-term planning through 2040, Chief of Space Operations Gen. Chance Saltzman said today.

Saltzman: Pentagon in 'generational moment' to improve acquisition process

NATIONAL HARBOR, MD -- The Defense Department is in the midst of a "generational moment" to reshape the acquisition process to deliver more effective capabilities more quickly, according to Chief of Space Operations Gen. Chance Saltzman.

A White House memo realigns the fiscal year 2027 federal research and development portfolio "to serve its core purposes: driving economic growth and high-wage employment for all Americans, promoting high quality of life, and ensuring U.S. leadership in critical sectors to our national security":

White House's FY-27 R&D plan highlights areas of DOD interest

The Trump administration today released its fiscal year 2027 research and development priorities for all federal agencies, highlighting several focus areas that have already attracted sustained attention from senior Pentagon leaders.

Document: OMB memo on FY-27 R&D budget priorities

Our colleagues at Inside Cybersecurity covered the testimony of the Trump administration's nominee to be the next Pentagon chief information officer:

DOD CIO nominee Davies identifies opportunities for realignment to meet zero-trust goals

Defense Department Chief Information Officer nominee Kirsten Davies highlighted the importance of reaching zero-trust implementation goals set out by the Pentagon and plans to address gaps if confirmed, in response to questions submitted in advance of her recent confirmation hearing.

Document: Senate hearing on DOD IG, CIO, R&E, SOLIC nominations

The Marine Corps today announced plans to officially establish an initiative intended to identify and adopt artificial intelligence-enabled decision-making tools in a bid to accelerate force modernization and increase the service's contribution to Pentagon-wide, combined joint all-domain command and control (CJADC2) efforts.

Dubbed Project Dynamis, the initiative will run in partnership with the Navy’s Project Overmatch. It was initiated via a memorandum signed Sept. 10 by Assistant Commandant Gen. Christopher Mahoney.

According to the announcement, Project Dynamis is aligned with the service’s larger force design initiative and has “a specific focus on developing end-to-end, joint interoperable capabilities that enable Marines to act as the forward element of the Joint Force -- sensing, making sense, and communicating weapons quality data at the speed and scale of relevance.”

Mahoney’s memo directs the establishment of a three-star council to oversee the initiative, consisting of the deputy commandant for combat development and integration and the deputy commandant for information. This council is tasked with delivering an initial plan and a “charter for governance, organization, authorities, and responsibilities” within 30 days.

The council has also been directed to coordinate with the assistant Navy secretary for research, development and acquisition to designate a Marine Corps deputy direct report program manager within Project Overmatch.

According to the service’s announcement, Col. Arlon Smith has been appointed as the Director for Project Dynamis.

“As Marines, our ability to aggregate, orchestrate, analyze and share fused data at machine speeds is a warfighting imperative,” Smith said in a statement in the release. “It is central to our value proposition. Project Dynamis is our bid for success to realize that vision.”

The Army is hosting an industry event at the end of the month to assess the level of ability and interest in what is geared up to be the service's first program of record for directed energy.

The Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office will host the event in Huntsville, AL, on Sept. 30 to give a production requirement overview and glean feedback on the Enduring High Energy Laser (E-HEL) program, according to a special notice posted today.

The program is planned to kick off in fiscal year 2026, wherein E-HEL will start “development, test and evaluation, systems engineering and program management,” according to Army budget books, while at the same time continuing directed energy development “to support modular, palletized and maneuverable capabilities.”

The Army has researched directed-energy capabilities for decades, but recently it has homed in on employing it specifically for short-range air defense to counter the rise in drones swarming the skies.

The Army’s capability office in June conducted a live-fire exercise at Ft. Sill, OK, centered around taking out drones using directed-energy prototypes alongside the Maneuver Short Range Air Defense (M-SHORAD) system.

The exercise was designed to see how directed-energy systems pair with kinetic systems like M-SHORAD, an Army release said -- but RCCTO has also developed a directed-energy variant of M-SHORAD, or DE M-SHORAD, which entails mounting a 50-kilowatt directed energy onto a Stryker vehicle.

“Now that we have delivered directed-energy capabilities to the Army we are developing and maturing the domains of policy, doctrine, organization, training and personnel to employ the capability optimally,” Col. Steven Gutierrez, RCCTO project manager for directed energy, said in a statement following the testing in June.

RCCTO earlier this month also received two Infantry Squad Vehicles fitted with AeroVironment’s LOCUST directed energy weapon system for prototyping under the Army Multi-Purpose High Energy Laster (AMP-HEL) prototyping program.

LOCUST offers a 20 kw-class laser for air defense, according to the company, and next month AeroVironment will deliver the system integrated into two Joint Light Tactical Vehicles.

RCCTO is expected to put out a request for information with a draft statement of work before the industry day, according to the notice; to attend companies must reply by the end of the day Sept. 26.